Tuesday, 14 June 2011

The Naming Of Things...

If a newspaper publishes a style guide to ensure the accurate and consistent use of words and terms, the equal and opposite reaction that naturally follows is a series of requests for changes in those rules.

Translation: ‘Oh, god, we’ve created a monster!’

One such request came after a columnist writing about superinjunctions – a word that is often misused to mean all injunctions, including, very occasionally, in the Guardian – produced the following sentence: "Child porn on the net is censored, and its users prosecuted."

Who could possibly object to that? Other than Gary Glitter…

The reader had very strong objections to the phrase "child porn". He said: "Please can you not call it this in future articles of this nature – 'child porn' is both a very offensive and trivialising term to use, especially (but not exclusively) to people who have been abused and filmed." They have suffered an everlasting offence, he argues, being abused and exploited as children, and then knowing that this is online somewhere for ever. "These images or films are of children being sexually abused or exploited (quite literally crime-scene photos or films). Porn they could only be described as if the media is aiming their stories at paedophiles.

And where any other newspaper would roll their eyes, laugh about 'the green ink brigade' and then file this letter in the round file, the 'Guardian' immediately went into spasm:

'Indecent images' is a far more accurate and acceptable term." The more such images are described as porn, the more it suggests an element of consenting adults: "The more this legitimises this crime in the eyes of the offenders, and also (my own view), the more it 'normalises' it in society," he writes.

You know, I think most normal people would disagree with you, but hey, I don'r work at the 'Guardian', a place where getting the most PC-agreeable term of reference is probably the first thing on everyone's mind...

… the reader makes a strong point that he then reinforces by describing the attitude of child welfare organisations to the term.

For instance, the Internet Watch Foundation, which fights child abuse on the web, states: "The IWF uses the term child sexual abuse content to accurately reflect the gravity of the images we deal with. Please note that child pornography, child porn and kiddie porn are not acceptable terms. The use of such language acts to legitimise images which are not pornography, rather, they are permanent records of children being sexually exploited and as such should be referred to as child sexual abuse images. If you see such content online please report it to the IWF."

Well, if the IWF is pro, the 'Guardian' could hardly be anti, could they?

The NSPCC only uses the term "child abuse images". The reader adds: "This is what the NSPCC have previously said to me: 'The NSPCC would agree with you that the expression "child porn" gives a misleading and potentially trivialising impression of what is a very serious crime. The NSPCC typically uses the term "child abuse images" as we consider this offers a more accurate indication of what these images portray'."

And so the 'Guardian' hurries to fall into line:

David Marsh, the editor of the Guardian's style guide, agrees, as do I, that this is a sensible change to the way the Guardian refers to images of child abuse. He intends to create a new entry in the guide and inform all staff of the new style.

'You VILL obey ze new rules...'

Of course, a new style guide entry doesn't stop the terrible abuse of children, but when we describe such images it will separate a despicable crime from a broader area of human sexual activity that washes back and forth across moral and legal boundaries that are harder to define.

Abused children everywhere will no doubt breath a sigh of relief that the 'Guardian' now knows what to describe them as...

A stinkwort by any other name.But I have heard that when these creatures are caught, whether it's called kiddy porn, child abuse, or whether they're called nonces, kiddy fiddlers or child abusers, the other prison inmates are in no doubt as to what sort of people they are. And often act accordingly.

A (now retired) primary school teacher that I know would once have described the people quoted in the OP as "stupid".

Later in her career, she was re-educated to call them "Educationally subnormal", abbreviated to ESN.

Once ESN began to be recognised as a term, she had to learn to say that they had "special educational needs".

After a while, people learnt what this meant, so it was changed to "Statemented", because no-one realised what the statement was (a statement of the child's, err, "special educational needs").

Meanwhile, when at home, the useful shorthand of "thick" worked well enough throughout her career.

It's kiddie porn. Everyone knows what that is. Everyone knows it's disgusting. If the Grauniad is saying that calling it "porn" means that I won't realise that it is disgusting then they are insulting my intelligence, frankly.

They might want to take that into account in their style guide... mustn't cause offence, must we?

What patently said. Everyone knows what child porn, kiddy porn or kiddy fiddler means. It's never said with anything other than a taste of disgust in the mouth and a tone of loathing for the perpetrators. Changing the "fancy name" of such things serves no ends other than making a few wordsmiths feel smug that they have, in some ridiculously imperceptible way way, "helped."

A lot of style guides contain valuable references (to the writer, at least) of how a publication deals with such matters as abbreviations, titles and whether it is M.P. or MP or even, mp.

But a good style guide is not about political or ideological semantics. What we have here is another example of the slow erosion of independent thought where, as patently indicated, words are being refined to mask rather than illuminate. Our language is being diverted from original meanings because either a word or phrase is appropriated because it sounds vague or even acceptable.

I know this will cause a shit-storm among those easily offended, but 'gay' is a great example. And yes, there are some pretty miserable ones of that persuasion out there.